Manga the week of 11/17

2 Replies

Next week from Midtown Comics features some stuff I got from Diamond this week, and some stuff everyone ELSE got this week but I, like Midtown, will get next week. Ah, the fun of being a Diamond Comics store customer! (Support your local comicke shoppe, yo.)

So Dark Horse shipped Archie Firsts to everyone but the Northeast Corridor this week. It promises to be an excellent archive volume, unlike IDW’s worthy but fairly random Dan DeCarlo collection. It has Archie’s initial appearance in Pep Comics, as well as reprints of his first self-titled comic, Jughead’s first, Betty and Veronica’s first, and Reggie’s first. (Yes, Reggie got a comic back in the day.) For Archie geeks, it’s a must buy.

Oh right, that header says manga. Digital Manga Publishing is releasing some new yaoi (well, if by new you mean almost 13 years old) called Treasure, the second volume of Kiss Blue, from the awesomely titled ‘Craft’ magazine, and the 4th omnibus Volume of Itazura Na Kiss, which presumably contains Vols. 7 & 8 of the Shueisha release, and will no doubt feature more of Naoki being Naoki.

Seven Seas is releasing a 3-in-1 omnibus of the first 3 Hayate x Blade books! If you’ve not checked this series out, I highly recommend it – some of the best slapstick action comedy in print today. And for a low low price! They also have the first Inukami omnibus, which… um, moving on…

In case you thought there was no Kodansha stuff coming out anymore, there’s still Udon! Which has the 3rd and final volume of Mega Man Megamix, originally put out by Kodansha in their kids’ manga magazine Comic Bom Bom.

Viz has the second volume of the low-key space drama Saturn Apartments from their SigIkki like, and the wheelchair basketball drama Real, which has been running for 11 years and is up to Volume 9. That’s already rather sad, but then you realize it runs in WEEKLY Young Jump.

And then there’s Yen, with the big debut of the week, K-ON! While I know that’s it’s not for everyone, particularly the plushy moe character design, it’s one of those 4-koma series that really works for me as slice-of-life. Speaking of massive media tie-ins, there’s also the third Spice & Wolf manga, from ASCII Mediaworks’ slightly more mature offshoot magazine, Dengeki Maoh. And there’s the third volume of Ichiroh!, which runs in the same magazine as K-ON!, debuted the same year, and which I really don’t care for. Ah, such is life.

What interests you this week?

Genkaku Picasso Volume 1

2 Replies

By Usamaru Furuya. Released in Japan by Shueisha, serialized in the magazine Jump Square. Released in North America by Viz.

I’ve long been a fan of Furuya’s other series that Viz released here long ago, Short Cuts. This was a 4-koma gag series about ko-gals that was released back in the late 1990s in Shogakukan’s seinen magazine Young Sunday. Its weird, disturbing, and vibrant sense of humor greatly appealed to me, and you could see the talent of the artist just oozing off the page. Unfortunately, it’s been harder to find him since then. 51 Ways To Save Her was licensed by CMX, but they folded before it could come out. Likewise, his adaptation of No Longer Human is also proving difficult to license. And Palepoli, his breakout series, was only partially translated in the Secret Comics Japan book.

So I’m very happy to see Genkaku Picasso out over here. It’s one of his more sedate works, but even normal Furuya is still really disturbing and weird. It ran in Shueisha’s Jump Square, which is their rebranded Monthly Shonen Jump, offering places for both Jump titles that wanted a more visible place (Rosario to Vampire, D.Gray-Man) and series like this, oddballs that aren’t really appropriate for Shonen Jump itself. Genkaku, by the way, means hallucination, which fits very well with the story of a sullen and introverted Japanese boy who has to use his artistic abilities to help people.

The cover shows Picasso biting his thumbnail, something that’s almost become a shorthand for the repressed and bullied Japanese male teen. I’ve seen similar in GTO and other shonen series, and honestly in another shonen series he’d probably be the problem to be solved, with our heroes trying to stop him from whatever foul plot he has to get noticed/get revenge/etc. But no, this kid is the star, and it’s his job to help people overcome their demons and deepest fears, with the help of his magical sketchbook and his deceased friend Chiaki, who has returned as a mini-Angel who lives in his pocket.

I say ‘magical sketchbook’, but this is not a case of ‘I am giving you these awesome tools’, and indeed there’s a possibility that all of the supernatural elements in this are not real. I doubt that’s the case, but no one but Picasso can see Chiaki, and when he ‘falls into’ his sketchbook he merely passes out in the real world. It’s a plausible deniability that helps to raise tension while keeping things in the real world. (We see Chiaki put something in Picasso’s pocket just before the accident that kills her, and she notes it’s ‘the inside of her heart’. If it was some sort of love letter or confession, all of this could be a hallucinatory rationalization on Picasso’s part.)

Furuya’s art has a certain style that’s not very much like anyone else. In Short Cuts, he would occasionally use a page or two to draw incredibly bizarre, surreal landscapes. That carries over here, as the sketches of people’s hearts that Picasso draws are very surreal, to put it kindly. Many of them are meant to be disturbing, and it’s always a treat seeing the main characters interact with this weird art.

On the downside, Picasso himself can be a very uninspiring hero. He’s a repressed, introverted Japanese boy, almost the exact opposite of your typical Jump hero, and though this experience is clearly designed to draw him out and help him win friends, his constant whining can grate on you. Likewise, many of the situations he’s trying to solve fall into the Psych 101 category (Chiaki is even seen reading psychology books at the start, as if this wasn’t obvious enough), and since each trauma has to be resolved in about 50 pages, the solutions can seem very pat. Oh yes, and Akane’s affection (and reason for it) is very creepy, but it’s FURUYA. Creepy is what he DOES.

Nevertheless I will definitely be getting more of this. Any manga that can have me theorizing about the reality or fantasy of it, and trying to work out its mechanics, has won me over. And there’s always a chance of more gloriously broken art in the future. And at only 3 volumes, this is easily something to collect to show off that not all Jump series are about ninjas and pirates. Recommended.

Gin Tama Volume 20

2 Replies

By Hideaki Sorachi. Released in Japan by Shueisha, serialization ongoing in the magazine Weekly Shonen Jump. Released in North America by Viz.

Poor Gin Tama. Not only does it not do well in the North American sales charts compared to its other Jump brethren, but it doesn’t even get respect among those who illegally scanlate the latest chapters from Japan! Determined to put out such titles as SWOT or Medaka Box as soon as the raws become available, uncaring scanlators leave Gin Tama alone for months at a time, only coming back when there’s a big battle.

Luckily, there is an answer! You can buy the manga from Viz, thus supporting the artist and publisher! And as your reward, Kyoko Shapiro and Lance Caselman will translate all the difficult puns that give you headaches whenever you look at them! It’s win-win! (I also note that Kyoko Shapiro, late of Aurora Press and now translating for Viz, has one of my favorite names ever.)

Meanwhile, back in Gin Tama, this volume starts out by quickly resolving the cursed sword arc that took up the majority of Volume 19. The traitor has been ferreted out, and the hired gun sent by Takasugi turns out to be no match for Gin’s pure stubborn awesomeness. Gin is almost the perfect shonen hero, bellowing out that he’s never fought any battles for a country or its people, but only to protect his friends, so nothing has changed.

Speaking of shonen awesomeness, I’ve noted the tendency Gin Tama has to sometimes kill people off, something usually avoided by other Jump titles. And here we have a traitor to the Shinsengumi, one who tried to have their captain killed. He can’t be allowed to live, even if he has seen the error of his ways and realized how foolish he was. So they give him a sword, and let him die honorably in battle, cut down by Hijitaka. It’s a beautiful thing.

The rest of this volume is, naturally, far more comedic and lighthearted, as Gin Tama returns to its gag manga roots. Whether it be mocking Jump artists’ tendency to imitate Dragon Ball Z, having Yamazaki (who, surprise, isn’t dead – see my review of Vol. 19) take an exam to see if he is fit to infiltrate the exclusionist rebels, or have everyone get shipwrecked while on a journey to the Dragon Palace, it’s loud, brash, and very, very funny. Again, if you can’t tolerate a manga whipsawing between low comedy and epic shonen drama, be wary of Gin Tama. Even a 2-part ‘serious’ story starring Kagura’s father turns out to have been a setup for one giant punch line.

My favorite chapter was one focusing on Kagura, who is generally cast as the role of comedic bruiser so often that we forget she’s also a teenage girl. She’s noticing the females around town have very girly umbrellas, and decides to trade in her superpowered one for a frilly model. Of course, these frilly umbrellas are not much use in typhoons. What follows is a quiet but heartfelt chapter that emphasizes Kagura’s good heart and tendency towards loneliness and self-doubt, something she’s usually very good at covering up.

Gin Tama is the most diverse manga currently running in Shonen Jump, offering something for almost everyone. Not as full of itself as Bleach, nor as completely loopy as Bobobobo-Bobobo, Gin Tama strikes a nice balance that I admire, and continually makes me wonder what will happen next. This volumes ends on another cliffhanger, with Gin and Katsura transformed into old, decrepit men! What can possibly happen next? The preview seems to suggest it will involve a lot of dressing up as giant turtles…